Rolls up several months late with Starbucks

So hey, got stuff together! I've done a lot of writing between updates and now I'm back to this story feeling a lot more confident! I won't jinxs us by promising a time span for updates, but just know we're still trucking ᕦ(ò_óˇ)ᕤ

Anyways this chapter is for all the lovelies who've waited so patiently

((Minor spoilers for the novel No Longer Human by Dazai Osamu))

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"Decompression sickness (DCS, also called the bends or caisson disease) is the result of inadequate decompression following exposure to increased pressure. Unusual fatigue, skin itch, pain in joints and/or muscles of the arms, legs or torso, dizziness, vertigo, ringing in the ears, numbness, tingling and paralysis, shortness of breath." (Diversalertnetwork)


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Eventually the hysteria dies back down but the warm atmosphere of companionship remains. As the minutes tick by it gets harder and harder for Tetsuya to think clearly. "Did we...do you think she noticed?"

His father snorts. "Definitely, she's a sharp one and you're kind of a mess. I might get some choice words later for letting you get drunk on a school night, but if you can keep it together tomorrow there shouldn't be any repercussions."

That's a relief. He's not sure how he would've been able to handle her disappointment if she had expected him to abstain. He's still not quite sure if this was the smartest idea, but he's been enjoying himself more than enough to outweigh that first rough patch. The memory spurs him to take another drink from his mug, and another wave of warmth flushes through his body.

"You might want to pace yourself a bit more. The faster you drink, the quicker it'll go to your head," his father advises, yet he contradicts himself by taking a deep swig from the bottle.

Tetsuya decides to heed his words anyways and sets down his cup, settling back into the couch to continue watching television. From the change in narration he comes to the conclusion that an entirely new program is airing now. The room is dyed many moving hues of blue as the ocean sparkles and swirls, the water in his head sloshing around in time with it. A journey to the depths of the sea, starting with the birds that bob along the surface, flying around and briefly swooping down to catch fish. If one were to ask him what type of bird it is or what the narrator is explaining, he wouldn't have been able to answer. All the noise, bird squawks and ocean waves wash over him like white noise and it does nothing to keep him awake.

It's fleeting.

An image from a memory is there and gone, as quickly as he blinks open his eyes.
He must have dozed off for a few minutes, because when his eyes have snapped back open the camera has transitioned from a bright azure to a deeper sapphire. He glances over at his father and sees the man fiddling with his phone, sitting just as he was before the impromptu nap. Their eyes meet.

"Welcome back. I thought you were out for the night."

Tetsuya takes a deep breath, feeling his chest expand before letting the air rush back out through his nose. "Wha- what time is it?"

"Two minutes to midnight."

Oh. It seems he woke up just in time. His mind is still in a fog but that short period of rest has lifted the invisible burden from his limbs.

Fish.

Swimming in a school, a brightly shimmering cloud of silvery sardines are slowly being herded into smaller groups as predators work together to pick them off. It's organized chaos, almost pitiful watching how little a chance they stand against all of these larger creatures teaming up against them. Dolphins, sharks, even birds start dive bombing as they're driven closer to the surface before a large blue whale rises from the deep to gulp down most of the remaining sardines. Not many survive the barrage, swimming around in confusion between the flurry of little bubbles-

"Happy seollal."

The words force his mind to breach back into reality.

He blinks. "Oh…Happy Seollal."

His father raises the bottle in toast and Tetsuya feels obliged to join him, taking up his mug once more and draining it empty in a few swift gulps. Perhaps he'll regret that later, but for now he's glad to lose some of the clarity sleep granted him. His father gives him an approving nod, and even pours a bit of straight rum back into his mug as soon as he sets it back on the table. He isn't so foolish as to sample more rum so soon though, so he leaves the cup alone.

The walls are splashed a deep navy blue, and as he sits motionlessly, the room begins to ever so slightly spin. It's like he's being sucked down a whirlpool, moving colours, bubbling ocean sounds, darker and darker as the camera moves lower.

"This is nice," his father says. "Us, having fun just drinking together like this."

'This is fun,' Tetsuya parrots in his head, 'This is fun. Fun. Fun. This is what fun is.' This is what a good time with his father feels like. A pleasant drowning, falling asleep in a hot tub as his body still flushes warm, and he feels weightless, and the couch rocks like a ship at sea. "...this is fun." The words dribble out of his mouth without thought, but they make his father smile again.

Things have never been better between them. This is good, this is fun, why was he so worried before? He's never felt more relaxed in his life.

He really has to pee.

Just as he fumbles with his arms for leverage to stand, his father says, "I wish I had something like this with my father."

Tetsuya sinks back into his seat and comes to a realization. While he's feels brave and his father's lips are loose, this is his chance to learn more. "...what was he like?"

The room turns near pitch black, and Tetsuya's focus shifts back to the television to realize the scene has sunk to the bottom of the ocean. Or something like that, deep enough for no light but the camera's to penetrate. There are flashes of colour, glowing organisms with milky eyes swimming about. With the light turned off, they appear to move in mysteriously hypnotic dances. They look like fireworks in the night sky.

"He hated holidays. We never celebrated anything." He can hardly see his father in the shifting glow, their lights contouring his father's face to look ghostly. "Halmeoni...she did her best with what we had. I remember one Seollal, she snuck into my bedroom...and we'd eat store bought pork buns in the dark." With the changing light source, it's hard to read what kind of expression his father is wearing, but he looks vacant. His eyes are dark pits, appearing almost black as he watches something Tetsuya can't follow.

"...Father?" The man blinks back to awareness and breathes a shuttering sigh. He licks his lips and goes back to his bottle, a quick sip as if he just needed something to do.

"So what do you think about Yozo?" he suddenly asks.

Tetsuya is more than confused by the sudden question. "Who?"

"Yozo," he repeats. "From No Longer Human. What do you think about him?" his father asks intently.

Still feeling a little off-kilter from the sudden change, and the still shifting couch, Tetsuya thoughtlessly answers, "He's kind of pathetic."

His father is visibly taken aback by his opinion, looks almost offended by it. "How so?" he prompts.

Tetsuya isn't sure where this strong opinion came from, but the more he considers his answer the more it burns to be said. "He starts out quite sympathetic, the kind of child to hide behind a cheerful and personable mask to be liked by others. But then as he grows up, he wonders why he can't connect with people despite the fact that he's never once tried to be genuine. By the time he attempts to be himself, he's forgotten who that is and he spends the rest of his life so...lost. That in itself isn't bad. That's..." Relatable.

Perhaps it's the kind of epiphany that one has when they're drunk, but Tetsuya knows what it feels like to lie to himself in order to lie to others. To let the lies seep in so thoroughly, truth becomes muddled; stains that soak in so deep that no amount of scrubbing will remove that spot.

He pulls himself out of his head. "That's something anyone can understand. But Yozo...he ruins people. He's so bitter…and lost, that he tries to find himself in all these kind, innocent women and he- and he ruins them. He keeps running from his problems like a coward. And the way he spends the rest of his days...Yozo is a character that makes me feel such pity," he finishes tiredly.

His father is silent, looking down at his lap motionlessly and a trickle of fear skims down Tetsuya's spine as he wonders if he's over-stepped. "...I can still understand him though. I don't condone what he's done, but...if you made a mistake...or you felt like you're going to fuck something up even more profoundly than you already have...wouldn't you want to quite while you're ahead? Wouldn't you feel like that's for the best, for everyone involved? If Yozo didn't leave, you can't say he would have been a good father to that little girl."

A deep sense of unease cuts through the fog of inebriation. "...M-….maybe...but...maybe running would be easier, but..." Tetsuya feels completely out of his depth. He's flailing with rocks tied to his limbs, it's so hard to think clearly and give a coherent rebuttal. Frustration bubbles up again. "It's just wrong! That little girl…she had a feeling he was no good, but she trusted him. It turned out to be foolish, and I'm sure all of those women figured that out too, but sometimes you have to take a chance on people! You…you have to try to meet them half way, not run…because it hurts to be left behind…"

Tetsuya isn't sure if he's still talking about the book. There's a profound sadness that finally numbs the joyful undercurrent that's buoyed the atmosphere all night. It's like he's fallen through ice and he's growing colder, sapped of all strength to keep swimming. That spinning sensation is becoming more pervasive, like a merry-go-round picking up speed and he feels sick. The room is abruptly bathed in light again as the program ends, and colourful advertisements flash across the screen with joyful jingles. He can't tell what his father is thinking. There are so many emotions he could project onto that intricately blank expression, but the one he finds most apparent is a deep pain.

"I know," he says, his voice just as carefully bleached of all colour, "but sometimes we have to hurt the ones we love." Here, at the bottom of the ocean, he has never seen his father more clearly.

"Love shouldn't hurt," he can't help but mutter almost petulantly.

His father snorts to himself, drinking with purpose this time. "There are a lot of things in this world that shouldn't be Tetsuya. But no one said love is pure, or good, or fair."
His logic leaves a sour taste in Tetsuya's mouth so he chases it away with more hot chocolate. He forgot what his father had poured into the cup. Yet mixed with the dregs of his hot chocolate his father was right, it almost is like water.

He sets down an empty cup, and for once his father does not pour him more. "I think you've had enough for tonight. It's time to go to bed."

This is a good kind of empty.

"Okay."

Stumbling to his feet is a chore, limbs moving without fine coordination, but he gets up and he stays there despite the minor nausea.

He stands there in a stupor as his father begins to clean up, and it takes him a minute to realize that he should be helping. He tries to pick up his cup – whether he planned to take it to the sink, or wipe underneath it, he hadn't thought so far ahead – but he ends up nearly knocking it over with a startlingly loud clang against the glass table. They both flinch as the sound and freeze in place as they wait for something to happen, eyes locked and postures hunched as if they're waiting for the first sign to flee. Tetsuya is the first to unfreeze, unable to hold still any longer as the floor continues to waver beneath him, stumbling to correct the lean he was unconsciously falling into.

"Alright, don't worry about this, just take care of yourself. Go to bed," his father instructs. Tetsuya is too tired and dizzy to argue, plus the need to urinate presses with greater urgency.

"Goodnight," Tetsuya whispers. As he teeters past his father, he's stopped by a hand on his shoulder. Tetsuya doesn't turn to face him, and his father doesn't spin him around either. The heat of his hand seeps into Tetsuya's skin.

He can hear the sharp but soft inhales that mark the start of aborted sentences before his father finally says, "I meant to tell you this earlier but I'm flying out to Germany soon. We're covering this festival, I'm sure I'll find somethings you'll like there."

"Oh." The monosyllabic response is packed with far more than he intended to say. "Thank you very much," he tags on almost thoughtlessly.

He's forced to stand there as his father continues to hold him, nothing to look at but the dark hallway in front of him. "You…you know I love you right?"

"Yes, I know you do," he says to the void.

"It's just a two-week trip, but I'm glad we spent some time together."

"I am too." He smiles at their overlapping shadows against the wall, faintly visible and slightly distorted while moving under the television's light.

The television quietly rattles off its own dialogue to fill the silence.

His father gives his shoulder one last squeeze before letting go, nothing to prove he was ever tethered in place but the phantom sensation. "I love you Tetsuya, Happy New Year's," he whispers before continuing to clean up.

"I love you too father," says Tetsuya before going on his way. And as his shoulder cools in mere seconds from their parting, Tetsuya comes to the perhaps obvious conclusion that love is not enough to keep him warm.


Awareness comes to him slowly, but as he breaches from sleep into consciousness, Tetsuya wakes up to silence. His heart beats calmly in his chest as he tries to pull his wits together. His mouth is dry, his mind is scattered, but his body has never felt more rested. He feels odd.

Empty?

No, he realizes under further scrutiny, he feels relaxed. He can't remember the last time he woke up to nothing. No anxiety worming through his gut as he lies in bed, six feet under piles of stress before he even opens his eyes. He feels...good today. Everything moves so fluidly, not a line of tension in his muscles, not a worry about the day ahead of him and he can't help but wonder if this is how everyone else normally feels. He had urinated before sleeping, but his bladder cries out with the same urgency. He stumbles out of bed, balance wavering before he finds his feet.

Strange.

It's only as the room smears like an oil painting as he walks does he come to a horrifying realization.

He might still be drunk.

He's not sure if that's even possible, but the floor is still a bit wobbly beneath his feet. Just as he grabs his phone to search about such a phenomena he realizes it's dead. With growing dread, he reluctantly looks at his digital clock.

He's an hour late for practice.

Stomach swooping with panic, he plugs in his phone to charge and haphazardly speeds through his morning routine. He returns from the bathroom and turns his phone on once he sees it has enough charge to stay functional. While he throws on a change on clothes his phone starts vibrating with the anger of a hornet's nest, letting him know about what is likely a plethora of missed messages from the team. He finishes dressing before picking up the device, looking at the many texts and missed calls from Riko and Kagami, along with Kise's usual spam. He decides to call Riko back first. The phone rings for half a dial tone before she picks up.

"You better have a good excuse Kuroko-kun, because we've been out of our minds with worry." Her voice is a painful mixture of anger with an overwhelming amount of relief underneath it. What is he supposed to say to that? He got drunk last night – very well may still be – and was too out of it to charge his phone? She would have his head for such irresponsibility, not to mention she would definitely be disappointed with him.

"I sincerely apologize coach, I over-slept," he quietly admits. "I swear I'll be there in fifteen minutes."

She sighs into the phone. "It's really no big deal, practice isn't mandatory anymore. We were just worried because it's not like you, we figured you would've called ahead if you weren't coming so we were getting nervous. I'm glad you're alright and I'll let the idiots know so they can stop being so twitchy. Kagami-kun's been eyeing the doors all morning, I'm not sure if he's waiting for you to come in or thinking about running out," she says with fond exasperation.

Shame curdles in his stomach for causing such unneeded panic. She hadn't even asked for further explanation, but Tetsuya feels required to say, "I was up late celebrating the lunar new year, and I suppose I forgot to reaffirm my alarm. Please pass on my apologies for causing undue distress."

"Sure thing. But don't think you're getting off easy! The next time you go missing without explanation, I'm going to make you wish to never be found," she says ominously. "Don't worry about practice today and catch up on sleep. We'll see you at lunch, bye Kuroko-kun!" She hangs up before he even has a chance to protest, so Tetsuya allows himself to sigh into the disconnected phone.

He feels too ashamed to even consider going back to sleep. Regardless of anyone's opinion or the supposed lack of harm done, he is not proud of passing out drunk and failing to wake up on time. It feels too much like his father. It feels like someone needs to punish him or at least hold him responsible. And if no one else will or can, he should do it himself. So he gathers all of his school supplies, hastily makes his bed and opts to skip breakfast in order to rush out the door faster. If he hurries, he should at least be able to play for half an hour and help clean up.

It's as he jogs down the street with clarity the crisp winter air grants him that he begins to feel unwell, even through the numbing haze of the remnants of inebriation. A stitch is quick to pull at his side and his mouth feels cotton dry despite the glass of water he can still feel sloshing around in his stomach. A headache is beginning to prickle through his brain and he slows to a crawl-speed walk from all of these sensations. He's not feeling so well all the sudden. He's starting to reconsider the wisdom to coming to school at all now.

The building sense of nausea is unmistakable now.

He hardly has time to lower his scarf when he vomits into the nearest snowbank. It's a blessedly short affair since he skipped breakfast, yet in hindsight he may not have thrown up if he had taken the time to eat as well. He's lucky it snowed last night, he merely kicks some fresh snow overtop of his regrets and pauses to rinse his mouth with water from his gym bag. He definitely doesn't feel well enough to play basketball now.

But he can't go back home either.

If he doesn't go to class, his mother will get a call. If she gets a call, she'll ask where he is. If he tells her he's not feeling well, she'll know he's hungover – and he doesn't need the internet to tell him that's what this is - and if she finds out he's hung over she'll be furious with him, as well as his father. On top of that, his father will be mad at him since attending school today was his only condition for the night. So if he goes home sick it's near synonymous with tearing the family apart.

His stomach is still rolling with sickness but he doesn't feel like vomiting any time soon. He slowly straightens from his hunch, and he's glad to note the few people milling about have paid him no mind. He still has five blocks to go, but at this pace he just wants to make it to class on time. A headache is starting to build and every whisper of winter sounds like a piercing shriek. The crunch of frost beneath his feet equivalent to the shattering of glass and the melodic chirp of a winter bird as soothing as a crow's caw.

Luckily his estimated time of arrival was off, and he makes it to school with ten minutes of their scheduled practice time left. There is one other person in the classroom but they don't notice his entrance and he is able to drag himself to his desk without external impediment. His desk is wonderfully cool against his pounding head in a way the abrasively sheer cold of outdoors wasn't.
He doesn't fall asleep, but he closes his eyes and dozes until the classroom begins to fill.


The rest of the day is spent in a similar fashion. He raised his head for lectures but he neglects to take notes, more concerned with the way the characters make him feel dizzy when he tries to read. He chooses to eat his lunch in the classroom and Kagami doesn't pester him to go to the cafeteria once he discloses that he feels a bit ill. He does suggest the nurse's office to sleep, but Tetsuya would rather deal with this himself and he doesn't want to miss class. Kagami had then offered to take notes in his stead, but he struggles to decipher his own writing sometimes so Kuroko doubts he could do it with this headache.

He tried to eat his own lunch of tteokguk at his desk after he convinces Kagami to leave him be, but in merely twenty minutes he has to rush to the bathroom as it makes its reappearance. His suffering comes to an end when after lunch, Kagami returns with two tablets of medication that Hyuuga apparently started keeping on his person once Kiyoshi returned to the team. Whether it was for headaches caused by Kiyoshi or for Kiyoshi incase his knee acts up, he never disclosed.

So that's how Tetsuya scraped together enough energy to attend afternoon practice. After reassuring everyone that he is feeling better now and thanking Hyuuga for the pills, everything continues like normal. Although his accuracy is good enough, Tetsuya still feels it's prudent to continue practicing his shots. He will be the first to admit he probably isn't paying as much attention as he should be. It's easy to let his mind drift as he goes through the repetitive motions, but as he sees the rebounded ball heading towards his face, he doesn't feel the willpower to catch it or even shift out of the way. He simply stares as it comes speeding towards him, and he anticipates the painful feeling of impact and the taste of blood that will probably start dripping from his nose.

Because he didn't even close his eyes, he is not startled by a large hand suddenly jerking in front of his face, stopping the ball in its track mere centimeters from his face. For some foolish reason he feels almost robbed.

"Anybody home?" Teases Kiyoshi as he tosses the ball from hand to hand.

"Ah, thank you Kiyoshi-senpai. My apologies, I should be paying more attention," he says with gratitude.

Kiyoshi dribbles the ball with his usual smile, but there's a mischievous look in his eyes. "Let's play catch Kuroko-kun!"

Tetsuya blinks in surprise at the request, but follows his senpai off to the side as to not impede on anyone else who wants to use the hoop. Once they're a good few feet apart, Kiyoshi sends the ball back to him with a bounce pass, prompting Tetsuya to return it with the same way. This is just as mindless as shooting hoops, but at least now he doesn't need to work his arms as much or crane his neck to stare at the hoop.

"So," Kiyoshi begins as he catches the ball, "what's eating you?"

Tetsuya catches and passes the ball twice before answering. "It's...yesterday was Seollal. The lunar new year's. I'm just tired."

Kiyoshi hums. "And how was it?" he sends the ball back with more strength, sending it bouncing back at him with more impact.

Tetsuya focuses on the tingle of his palms, the texture of the ball as it leaves his hands. "Different."

"I bet. Was your grandmother a big part of your life?" He asks casually, a curious tilt to his head.

Tetsuya manages to catch the ball, but he hesitates to send it back, disrupting the rhythm they'd fallen into. "Very much so." It's odd that a lifetime of memories can be condensed into those three words.

Kiyoshi catches the ball with a sympathetic look, his smile a lot more tender than his previous grin as he returns the ball. "I get that. I lost both my parents when I was young."

Tetsuya bounces the ball back a bit too short, forcing Kiyoshi to take a step forward to catch it. "I'm so sorry for your loss, Kiyoshi-senpai."

Before he has a chance to begin berating himself for anything, Kiyoshi says, "Don't be. I don't remember enough to miss them much, my grandparents raised me for most of my life. That's why I feel so bad about your grandmother, I can hardly imagine what you must be going through."

Tetsuya shakes his head. "It's...hard, but I still have my parents with me." Perhaps not as often as he'd like, but this has been a reminder that he should be grateful to have them at all. If he were raised by his grandparents, he'd be overwhelmed with worry. The elderly are fragile in health, every day could be their last. Kiyoshi definitely has the shorter end of the stick but for some reason he's still looking at him with those sad eyes.

They pass the ball back and forth a few more times without speaking.

"So anyways, I wanted to invite you over to dinner some time," Kiyoshi suddenly announces. He catches the ball but does not pass it back, leaving Tetsuya to feel unbalanced.

"Oh...are you sure that I would not be-"

Kiyoshi cuts him off with a laugh, "If it were any trouble, I wouldn't've invited you. I've already told them all about my cute little kouhai, and they're dying to feed you. And if you say no, then I'll be forced to invite Kagami-kun instead and he'll eat us out of a house," he sighs dramatically. They both know Kagami has more restraint than that, but the joke brings a smile to Tetsuya's face.

"Alright then, I'll gratefully accept your invitation. Thank you very much Kiyoshi-senpai," he says with a bow.

Kiyoshi lets out a goofy laugh. "Let's have fun," he sings before finally returning the ball.

Although they're just playing catch, Tetsuya feels a familiar euphoria as the ball bounces between them. A small smile does not leave his face for the rest of practice.

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Hopefully my style hasn't changed too much! Sorry if there are mistakes, I was too excited to post. Thanks for reading, the next chapter will feature Akashi, so I'm really looking forward to it. See you then! d(,,・ε´-,,)⌒